The Essential Gwendolyn Brooks

Many thanks to Erin for reminding me about how wonderful Gwendolyn Brooks is. This is a distillation of the “essential” poems of her life, including the perfect We Real Cool. I didn’t realize that Brooks was the first African-American to receive a Pulitzer, obtained in 1950 for her book Annie Allen. Born in Topeka, KS in 1917, she moved to Chicago as part of the Great Migration only a few months after her birth.